The story could have been scripted in Hollywood. An impulsive hitchhiking trip to the Pacific Northwest resulted in a 40-year love affair, one of the top bands to come out of Portland, Oregon, and a song that became an emblematic hit of the 1980’s; “I Can’t Wait.”

These are the makings of the Nu Shooz narrative. The stories are woven together through the lives of the husband and wife visionaries behind the group, Valerie Day and John Smith. One day in 1975, on a whim, John thumbed his way from San Pedro…